


Nightmare Memories

by Dierdre2



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Genre: Gen, Original Character(s), Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-19
Packaged: 2017-11-21 16:08:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dierdre2/pseuds/Dierdre2
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When a tragic experience haunts your psyche and sleep has ceased to be a refuge, what steps must you take to find peace again?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_AN: Rated PG-13 for a smattering of gore and bad language. Nothing too severe._

* * *

The soldering iron slipped from his fingers for the third time that evening and Donatello sighed, finally admitting defeat. He was going the burn down the lair if he kept this up.

As the utensil powered down with the soft hiss of cooling metal he removed his goggles and rubbed at his aching eyes. Peeking through fingers made clumsy with weariness he glanced at the digital clock inset at the corner of his workbench. He blinked his sandpaper lids once and groaned. 2 a.m. How could it be 2 a.m.?

_Better get yourself to bed, Donnie-boy,_   _or you're gonna be completely worthless in the morning._

Reluctantly conceding that his conscience had a very good point he stood and stretched, grimacing as his joints popped and creaked in protest. Shutting off the light and plunging his room into darkness, Donatello removed his belt, mask and pads. Dropping them carelessly to the floor, knowing but not caring that he'd merely doomed himself to trip over them once he awoke, he staggered wearily towards his bed… only to stop and stare at its shadowy form with the same trepidation one might usually reserve for a rabid alligator.

He displayed a rare burst of temper by clenching his fists and sending a muttered curse flying into the darkness. It shouldn't be like this.

_Sleep is essential for maintaining health in both mind and body,_  he told himself sternly,  _and there is nothing to fear from dreams._   _They are merely your subconscious' way of processing information._

_Yes, but dreams usually manifest themselves as a series of symbolic or nonsensical images,_  another voice quietly proclaimed. _And this isn't merely a dream_.

_It's a memory._

"Shut up," he growled audibly. Shaking his head and feeling like a schizophrenic for actually arguing with himself, he defiantly threw back the tattered blanket and crawled into bed.

Lying on his plastron with his head buried in his forearms, he wrestled his legs under the blanket. His shoulder muscles began to tense as sleep frayed the edges of his waking mind, but he closed his eyes firmly and forced himself to relax. There would be no dreams tonight. Not again.

A final sigh hissed through his teeth as unconsciousness picked him up in surprisingly gentle talons and carried him away.

* * *

"Cowabunga!"

Donatello glanced over his shoulder at his wildly cavorting brother and gave him a look of disbelief. "Just where do you come up with this stuff, Mikey?"

Michelangelo was grinning widely as his feet touched down on the rain-slicked rooftop, cheerfully exuberant after executing a perfect 360 spin which sent him sailing gracefully from the lip of one rooftop to another. Picking up speed he drew himself abreast with his quiet brother and responded, "TV, a' course. Some surfer dude kept yellin' it while performin' some righteous stunts on his board." Spying a small slanted metal roof that probably protected an air-conditioning unit, he leapt to the top and slid down the wet metal in a decent approximation of a surfer's pose. "It was, like, totally awesome, dude!"

As his feet once again touched concrete a hand lanced out of the gloom under the tin roof and grabbed the trailing tails of his orange mask. He yelped and spun around, fists raised in automatic defense as Donatello stopped as well, only to immediately relax when a gravelly voice reached his ears:

"Learn some new material fast, Mikey, 'fore I'm forced ta staple yer lips shut."

The youngest turtle grinned happily at what was, for Raphael, a cordial greeting. "Hey, bro! Where ya been?"

"Around," he hissed in reply, stalking out of the overhanging shadows. "I got bored runnin' in circles wit' you three idiots, so I found my own fun."

Noticing the split and bloody knuckles that marred Raphael's hands, Mikey's grin faltered. "Who?"

"Just a couple a kids tryin' ta hold up a convenience store." He grinned toothily, apparently not feeling the spreading purple bruise that splashed across one cheek like wine. "Needless ta say, they got a little more than they bargained fer."

Seeing the look his two younger brothers exchanged, he scowled and threw his hands in the air in frustration. "For Chrissakes! I didn't kill 'em, okay? They'll have a few extra scars but they'll live. Okay!"

"All right, all right," Donatello said, making conciliatory motions with his hands. "Let's just get moving again. Leo's bound to be a mile ahead of us by now."

"I'm right here, Don," came a calm voice from behind them, causing the three to snap their heads around in surprise. Leonardo was crouched on the railing with his hands resting on his bent knees, bathed in moonlight and seemingly unaware of the sixty-foot drop that yawned directly beyond his shell.

"I could hear you guys talking from three rooftops over," Leo said. He favored them all with an admonishing glance, only to stop when he took in Raphael's disheveled and bleeding state. His voice lost some of its steely edge as he asked, "You okay?"

"'Course I am," Raphael groused.

"Good." Leonardo dropped off the railing and padded silently over to them before crossing his arms and glaring outright at Raphael. "Now why did you go running off on your own without telling any of us?"

"'Cause it was none a yer business, that's why!" he exploded. "And there ain't no point chasin' yer bony ass 'round th' whole damn city! It's a waste a time!"

"We're  _here_  because Master Splinter wants us to improve our speed and agility during post rainfall conditions," their blue-masked leader replied, keeping his voice steady with an effort, "not so you can let out aggressions by battering defenseless idiots."

"Defenseless!" Raphael sputtered. "They had baseball bats an' switchblades, Le- _o!_  I wouldn't call that defenseless!"

Leonardo sighed and shook his head, distressed at his brother's lack of understanding. Glancing knowingly at the bloodstains still adorning his sais (and at the single unnoticed human hair curled around one finger like bizarre jewelry), he gave Raphael a look that spoke volumes:  _They might as well have been._

The memory of terror etching itself across the faces of those young punks, quickly disarmed and pummeled by a shadow they could barely touch, flashed across Raphael's consciousness and for a moment he felt guilt stir like a leviathan in the deep. Furious and not a little alarmed he forced the emotion back under a seemingly bottomless ocean of eternal anger, drowning it thoroughly before the regret could reach his eyes.

More shaken by this near-slip than he would ever admit, he brought his face just inches away from his brother's own, eyes so full of fiery rage that by all rights Leonardo should have burst into flame. "Well, screw this little family outing," he hissed. "And screw you, Fearless. I'm outta-"

His angry tirade was effectively silenced by a scream wafting up from the city streets below; a high, hopeless wail that sounded so desperate and forlorn Donatello felt a shiver lance up his spine. Glancing away from the direction of the fading scream long enough to shoot Leo a final withering glare, Raphael spun on his heel and launched himself off the roof, plunging two stories before landing cat-like on the fire escape below. The metal construct didn't even creak as the turtle descended to street level at a speed that seemed akin to magic.

Leonardo found himself fuming silently, one arm still outstretched to prevent their hotheaded brother from departing. He exchanged glances with a shrugging Donatello and a grinning Mikey before sighing explosively and growling, "Let's go."

* * *

They discovered the source of the scream nearly a quarter of a mile away, in the back alley of an abandoned warehouse. Raphael was already slinking along the roof of the building when his brothers finally caught up with him, hugging the shadows and visible only to those specially trained to see such things.

The trio followed his path up the fire escape without preamble, moving silently until they came abreast of their wayward sibling. Pausing only long enough to favor the unrepentant turtle with a narrow-eyed glare promising a long lecture to come, Leonardo crouched down and peeked over the concrete rim. His other brothers followed suit and Donatello's eyes widened at the sight that greeted them.

At least a dozen armed figures were advancing towards a single individual that was steadily shuffling backwards in a state of perpetual retreat, like a rabbit cornered by a wolf pack. And pack hunters they did appear to be; walking forward with the easy rolling swagger of carnivores that know their prey cannot escape.

The hunted in this case was a woman, her slightly plump form wrapped in the remnants of what used to be a fine business suit. Judging by her ruined hosiery and the sad state of her bruised and tattered feet, she had been running barefoot for some time, her heels either kicked off or lost at some point during her headlong flight. Apparently sheer terror had allowed her to run swiftly enough to stay ahead of them; that is, until she'd made a critical error by running into an alley with no exit.

The woman had not cried out since her scream split the night mere minutes ago, but that didn't mean her fear had abated. Instead her breath rasped in a throat made hoarse by terror and exertion, one hand sweeping behind her in a desperate attempt not to run into anything.

A low chuckle from one of her shadowy aggressors tore a low whimper from her throat and seemed, strangely, to loosen the paralytic grip on her tongue. "P-please, stop this!" she said. "You have my car and m-my purse. I haven't seen your f-f-faces, so I can't identify you t-to the police. Just leave me alone!"

This last sentence squeezed from her throat like a scream and the man closest to her threw back his head and laughed. "Sorry, sweetheart, but we can't do that. We have plans for you."

Unpleasant sniggers of agreement from behind the speaker caused her to gasp and stumble over a bit of broken concrete, landing on her rear and exposing a long length of leg. The momentum of her fall caused her to throw her head back briefly, the moonlight bathing her upper torso, and Donatello found himself looking into the pleasant, high-cheekboned face of a young woman. Her eyes were wide and startlingly blue above a mouth that seemed far more suited to laughter and mischievous grins than to the grimace of terror distorting it now.

Twisting her body around she pushed herself to her feet, a tangled waterfall of russet hair slipping across one shoulder and hiding her hands from view. She kept her body canted to one side as she straightened again, looking for all the world like she was cringing submissively, yet the turtles were surprised to see a sizable chunk of concrete gripped tightly in one hand. So the rabbit had teeth after all.

This unexpected development seemed to have an impact on Leonardo's plan of attack. One of his tri-fingered hands lifted and patted the air before pointing at the woman. After a slight pause he patted air again and, pointing at the street lamp illuminating the alley's entrance, drew a finger across his throat. This simplistic form of sign language translated into an easily understood order:  _Wait until the woman acts… then move into position. Once I take out the light… attack._

Not knowing that help was only about eighteen vertical feet away, the woman didn't need to fake the fine trembling that vibrated her bones as the spokesman twirled his knife with a flourish and began to advance. "Just be a good girl," he whispered in an almost comforting fashion. His free hand reached out to stroke her hair.

She howled like a maddened animal at the touch of his callused fingers and reacted with instincts she didn't know she had. Twisting away from him with surprising agility she pivoted her body around, arm held straight from the shoulder, and smashed the bit of concrete into the side of his face with all the force of a swung Morningstar.

Michelangelo had to bite back a cheer as the unfortunate crook's cheekbone shattered like a china plate, a fine spray of red erupting from his split lips. Every eye in the alley was on him as his knees buckled and he silently toppled sideways. Not one thought to look up as the moonlight was briefly blocked by four flitting shadows.

During this moment of eerie silence the woman pawed frantically at the body in front of her, hands scrabbling until she found the hilt of his knife. Gripping it firmly she began to back away, hoping against hope that her show of gumption would sway those remaining to just take what they'd won and let her be.

Apparently this was a foolish hope, for a collective growl suddenly rose up from the assembled thugs and the barrel of a gun glinted coldly in the night. "Not smart, bitch," the gun wielder growled, aiming the weapon with an experienced hand. "Not smart at all."

Her arms were rising in a futile effort to shield her face when a bright flash of metal suddenly sang from the darkness and buried itself neatly in the gunman's hand. The gun spun away from his grasp as he clutched at his nearly severed fingers, bellowing like a castrated bull.

The gun hadn't even touched the ground when another miniature comet whirled over their heads and shattered the street lamp above them, raining sparks and plunging the alley intoshadow-shrouded darkness. For one breathless moment all was silent except for the pitiful whimpers of the injured man…

And then there was a whisper of movement behind them, and the screaming really began.


	2. Chapter 2

_**AN:**  More violence this time but less cursing. So it all evens out, right?_

* * *

The woman took advantage of the gunman's disarmament by diving behind the alley's dumpster. Pressing her back against the cold metal and trying not to smell the ancient odors emanating from it, she uselessly clutched her stolen knife in both hands and listened intently as darkness abruptly descended. For a moment all was silent, filled with nothing but anguished moaning and the frantic hummingbird thrum of her own heart.

Then chaos parted its misshapen beak and howled.

It was bedlam, pure and simple, a base sensory overload that caused her to drop the knife in her lap and clamp her hands over her ears. So much noise. The shuffling slide of shoes on asphalt and a curious sharp singing as thin metal cut the air to pieces. A steady dull thumping as bodies were struck with fists and feet, metal and wood, counterbalanced by an occasional truncated chatter of gunfire and the sporadic shotgun crack of bones giving way under stress. And, over and above it all, like icing on the cake, were voices raised in triumph and in warning, in fear and in wild exaltation. This violent potluck of sounds washed over her in a tangled wave and filled the alleyway to the brim.

The dumpster suddenly shuddered violently and hummed its vibrations up her backbone as someone, just inches away, slid down the battered metal to the ground.  _Oh, God, what's happening?_

Knowing it wasn't the wisest thing to do but nevertheless forced by a wild need to  _see_ , she peered over the dumpster's rim and squinted into the moonlight. What she saw made her forget the unholy clamor and gave her cause to question the very foundation of her sanity.

At first she thought they were dressed in costumes, but even in the watery light of the moon she could soon tell they moved far too well to be so encumbered. There was a fluidity about them, a grace, that could never be accomplished in anything else but one's own skin.

There appeared to be at least three of the creatures, all armed with weapons so archaic they might have been laughable under different circumstances. The one closest to her, who didn't seem the least impeded by a domed shell as rigid as armor plating, was manipulating what appeared to be a long pole. A simple length of wood, yet proficient in his amazingly dexterous hands.

Even as she watched he tossed the weapon into the air, deftly caught one of the ends and spun low with the wood extended before him, sweeping three thugs off their feet. Another simple twirl and a wooden end struck two behind the temple with the clinical perfection of one familiar with human anatomy. Within less than the span of four heartbeats two of her would-be assailants were down for the count, breathing at the slow speed of the deeply unconscious.

For all their speed and skill, however, they were apparently not invulnerable. Even as the creature's weapon swept towards his temple the last man, disoriented and prone on the ground, threw his knife with the wild strength of desperation. The blade spun furiously for an instant as it cut through the air, only to quickly lose power as it slid along a length of green thigh and clattered to the ground.

Blood welled in a dark ruby line and the creature cried out, the pain in his voice sharp and surprisingly human, yet the downward path of his staff never faltered. Another criminal down.

Gripping the pole in his right fist he clutched his injured thigh and hissed. Taking a few pained breaths he appeared to center himself, before leaping gracefully to the aid of another of his kind, his staff whirling in a high arc.

They were… helping her?

Suddenly overwhelmed, she crouched back behind the dumpster and squeezed her eyes shut.

* * *

Leonardo felt the onrush of air as the last remaining mugger lashed out with a desperate bladed fist. He dodged the wild swing and grabbed the startled man's wrist, striking his flattened palm against the outstretched elbow and dislocating it with a meaty crack. His machete spinning into the night, the man immediately dropped to the ground and curled himself around his injury, too trapped in frozen agony even to scream.

There was a shivery hiss as a blade sliced air and the pommel of Leonardo's katana clipped the top of his opponent's skull. The man's eyes rolled back. A final twitch of his wounded arm, a sigh in the dirt, and just like that, the fight was over.

Leonardo indulged in a playful flourish of his swords as silence descended upon the alley once more. Sheathing the blades behind his shell in a motion so practiced it required no thought, he straightened up from his fighting crouch and looked around, seeking out the locations of his brothers.

Raphael was leaning against the alley wall, shoulders hunched, wiping his sais clean with a battered T-shirt procured from one of the fallen. At the alleyway entrance Michelangelo idly twirled his nunchucks and hummed to himself, bouncing on his heels in time to music only he could hear.

Leonardo's eyes narrowed in unease at the sight of Donatello crouched near the dumpster, speaking lowly to someone hidden in the shadows. While the fight couldn't have gone smoother and the woman had yet to succumb to hysterics (a definite point in her favor), something about this situation didn't feel right. He suddenly wanted nothing more than to ensure the woman's safety and leave. Home was starting to sound really good right now.

With this goal in mind he fished a coin out of a small pouch in his belt and tossed it at his youngest brother, who belted his weapons and caught the silver disk deftly. "Go call the police, Mikey. I think there's a payphone a few blocks from here."

"Aw, Leo," he complained. "I wanted to meet the dudette. Can't Raph do it?"

As he prepared to toss the coin at Raphael the red-masked turtle snarled and spun his sai, gripping it by the center prong and drawing back as if to hurl it. Michelangelo yelped and crossed his arms over his face. "No! I'm too pretty to puncture!"

Leo cast a quick glance at the heavens, as if asking for patience. "Just do it, Mike."

"Okay, okay! Yeesh," he muttered, fitting his hands with shuko spikes and climbing nimbly up the warehouse wall. As he hauled himself over the rim and disappeared from view, his voice wafted faintly back to them in a bad imitation of Rodney Dangerfield, "No respect! No respect at all…"

Raph once again belted his sai, and in a rare moment of camaraderie, shared a grin with Leo; that half-amused, half-exasperated expression most people seemed to acquire when around Mikey for any length of time. The moment didn't last long, however, for as his gaze flicked back to the unconscious forms around him his expression soured in disgust. Pausing only long enough to state, "I call lookout, Fearless," he donned his own spikes and followed Michelangelo's path up the wall.

Leo sighed internally but didn't protest. Raphael never did have any patience with the aftermath of one of their rescues, namely the cleanup, and it just wasn't worth arguing with him about it anymore. So he started at the end of the alleyway himself and began working towards Donnie and the girl, intent on removing all physical evidence that they'd ever been there.

* * *

Huddled for the past few minutes in the dubious safety of the dumpster's shadow, she had almost convinced herself that what she'd seen had been nothing more than a hallucination brought about by an overabundance of fear and poor lighting. Despite her original assumption they  _must_  be nothing more than costumed martial arts experts, or… or a rival gang encased in strange body armor. Yes, they must be. If she let herself think otherwise she might as well start believing in aliens, or ghosts, or alligators in the sewers.

She had almost worked herself into a state of composure when the tumultuous sounds of violence abruptly ceased. Silence rushed in, vast and echoing, only to be broken a few moments later by a soft voice asking:

"Are you okay?"

Her eyes flew open and she gaped in amazement.

Logical theories were hard to maintain, however, when one of the creatures was crouched in front of her. Cloaked in darkness and nearly impossible to see, its inhuman origins were nevertheless betrayed by moonlight, which outlined the edges of a large shell and glinted off a skull that could never have been human.

She gripped her blade with white-knuckled fingers and pressed her back to the wall.

* * *

Donatello suppressed a sigh as the woman attempted to meld her spine with the brickwork, her eyes wild with terror. He hated this.

It was better when the criminals they fought were few in number. Not only was it much easier to dispatch them and leave them gift-wrapped for the police, but they were also usually gone before the one they'd rescued had any idea of what they were. But in situations like this, when the thugs were numerous or the authorities too far away, they couldn't immediately leave. There was too great a chance one of the delinquents would awaken and harm the girl after they left, or that she would simply panic and run straight into the arms of another gang.

So it made sense for them to stay until the police were near the scene. It even made logical sense for him to speak to her; she'd just been through a difficult situation and conversation sometimes helped to lessen the fear of a traumatized person. Even conversation with a strange individual who never ventured far from the shadows.

…Nevertheless, he should have just waited for Mikey. Good-humored and loquacious, his brother was much more skilled at putting people at their ease. He actually seemed to  _enjoy_ these infrequent talks; taking great pride in coaxing a smile or even a shaky laugh out of one of the recently rescued. He'd brag about his psychiatric skills to his long-suffering brothers ( _"That's **Dr**. Mikey to you, dudes!") _ and be happy for days afterward.

Donatello, on the other hand, had no such knack and was even now cursing himself for so rashly volunteering to play spokesman. The fight had been quick and flawless (the slice across his leg notwithstanding) and he'd still been coasting on an adrenalin high when he'd crouched by the dumpster and spoke to her as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Stupid, stupid.

It had only taken a moment for her horrified expression to purge the last of the endorphins from his system, leaving him with a terrible awkwardness that seized his tongue and filled his chest with a leaden weight. Surrounded by the comforting familiarity of his lab and family it was often easy to forget how different he was… until moments like this brought the truth home with all the subtly of a sledgehammer between the eyes.

Swallowing the sudden lump in his throat, he tried again. "Take it easy, ma'am. I'm not going to hurt you. I'm one of the good guys."

She didn't seem to find much comfort in this honest statement, for she still clutched her knife like it was her last link to sanity, a fearful expression peeking out from behind strands of her wavy hair. Feeling a little desperate, he took a cue from the conversation taking place behind him and said, "One of my brothers is going to go call the police, but it'll take approximately twenty minutes for them to arrive. So I need to know now, ma'am; are you all right? Do you require any immediate medical attention?"

He stopped speaking and waited hopefully for some sort of reply, but was quickly disappointed when the silence began to stretch to painful lengths. Watching the woman's hands shake he realized, with a sudden sick lurch in the pit of his stomach, that he'd never felt more like a freak.

_Enough of this. Enough._

Sudden bitterness burned through him, bringing with it a taste like corroded copper pennies in his mouth. Hating the feeling but unsure how to deal with it, he rocked back on his heels and straightened. "Just… stay there, okay?" he said brusquely. "The police will be here soon."

He had turned away and was about to aid Leo when a feminine voice, sounding hesitant and not a little stunned, suddenly asked, "Who… what  _are_  you?"

Don turned around to find that she had straightened out of her fearful huddle and was now sitting almost normally, her eyes wide at the sight of his standing form outlined in moonlight. She was still afraid and bewildered, but the sharp edge of her terror was dulling under burgeoning curiosity.

Eyes narrowing at the question, he stiffened his already erect posture and answered with cool pride, "My name's Donatello. And I am Ninja."

* * *

 _Donatello,_  she thought dizzily. _My rescuer is a giant ninja tortoise named Donatello._

And why not? In a world gone suddenly mad it seemed perfectly natural for talking reptiles to be named after famous Renaissance sculptors. Hell, the aliens were probably named after Cubist painters.

A hysterical giggle threatened to claw its way out of her throat. She choked it back with difficulty, overcome with a sneaking suspicion that once she started laughing she wouldn't be able to stop.  _Get a grip, girl,_  she told herself sternly.  _You can go gibber in a corner later. Right now you need to find out just what the hell's going on._

Feeling mentally shaky but resolute, she pushed herself to her feet. Unable to suppress a wince as pain lanced across the soles of her tattered feet, she awkwardly shoved the long knife into her jacket pocket.

* * *

Donatello kept his expression carefully blank when the woman stood and pocketed her blade, the hilt peeking almost comically out of the dark blue fabric. His forced aura of indifference began to waver, however, when she took a few mincing steps into the moonlight, fixed him with a searching gaze, and then grinned crookedly.

Noting with some relief that the woman's hands had almost stopped shaking, he was unable to stop himself from smiling slightly in return, although his voice retained its steely edge. "Feeling better?"

"A bit," she replied, her voice still unsteady but growing stronger by the moment. "I've come to the conclusion that I've either gone stark-raving loony… or this is the strangest thing that's ever happened to me." She raked her fingers through her hair and gave him another exploratory glance, her expression a strange mix of lingering disbelief and rising awe. "I'm guessing it's the latter. You're not a hallucination, are you?"

He shook his head, irony in his eyes. "No, I'm afraid not."

"Oh." She stared at the body-strewn alley for a long moment before abruptly blowing out a breath and extending her hand. "In that case, my name's Constance. Thank you for rescuing me, Donatello."

Shocked but nevertheless pleased with this unexpected development, his anger quickly faded into memory as he slowly took the offered hand. He shook it once. "Everyone calls me Don," he said, his tone once again warm. "And you're welcome."

Constance grinned again, and Donatello decided he liked the way it made her eyes sparkle. "Call me Connie."

* * *

David Snider had never had any patience with horror movies. It had always irritated him to no end that, while hiding from the generic monster-of-the-week, the future victim would invariably do something stupid to get him/herself caught; like sneezing, screaming, tripping over something obvious or in the case of one memorable B moviebelching loudly. As the blood began to fly and the bones to crunch, he would sit back and watch with satisfaction, secure in the knowledge that they'd gotten what they deserved.

But now… now he sympathized completely. It was pure and utter torture to lie with his forehead tucked under the crook of his left elbow, unmoving, soundless, while his attackers picked their way amongst the unconscious bodies of his fellows. His hand was thankfully beginning to numb but his head was still aching horribly from when the red-masked creature had tossed him against the dumpster. A migraine pounded in time with his heart as he breathed in the dusty air, the urge to sneeze was becoming almost desperate and something hard was digging painfully into his shoulder. To top it all off, he really needed to take a leak.

Yes, torture was an accurate word, but he nevertheless concentrated on not moving a muscle. When heavily-armed real-life monsters assume you're unconscious, it's not a good idea to give them cause to rethink.

He could hear one of the creatures walking steadily towards him, its gate pausing occasionally in a way that made him nervous, as if it was systematically searching every inch of the alley. Gripped by a sudden horrible suspicion, David cracked open one eye and peaked out at the world through a narrow gap between his arm and the concrete.

Outlined in silver against the moonlight, a bulky figure was bending over and picking something up from the ground. The creature straightened and dropped the object into a pouch on its belt, but not before it glinted in the dim light and gave David a glimpse of its shape. He suppressed the urge to groan. The pronged metal disk was a twin of the one buried in the flesh of his right hand.

As the creature moved closer he allowed his eye to slide closed, mentally squaring his shoulders against the ordeal to come. Trapped in what was rapidly becoming his own private hell, moments passed like hours before he finally felt a presence looming over him. David began to pray for strength from a god he'd long since ceased to believe in.

He had difficulty suppressing a shudder when the thing encircled his wrist with a hand that felt somehow  _wrong_  and gripped the shuriken tightly. The pain was sharp and blinding as the metal was extracted from his flesh, but somehow, in a kind of twisted miracle, he didn't cry out. Not a moan, not even a twitch. He was as limp as a dead man.

The monster seemed to suspect nothing as it dropped his wrist and swiped the shuriken across the back of David's jacket, wiping the blood away. It straightened and for a moment simply stood over his recumbent form, filling David with a sick certainty that it'd seen through his ruse. However it finally turned on its heel and began walking deeper into the alley.

David could have cried with relief. Perhaps there  _was_  someone watching over him after all, for not only had his opossum impression worked but he'd finally figured out just what was digging such a painful groove into his right shoulder. He'd fallen on the barrel of his pistol. The grip was nestled in the hollow of his collarbone, rendering it invisible to the creature but only inches away from his good hand.

Not daring to move his head from its position, he bent his left elbow further and stretched out his fingers one millimeter at a time. It was an agonizingly slow method that required all his limited patience, but when his fingers finally wrapped undetected around the grip of his gun, he felt a surge of gleeful triumph.

He had a pistol with a full clip and the advantage of surprise. The freaks were as good as dead.


	3. Chapter 3

_**AN:**  Violence and explicatives galore! You have been warned._

 

* * *

 

Leo's hand paused in the act of dropping the last shuriken into its pouch. That uneasy feeling of wrongness was spiking again, but for the life of him he couldn't figure out just where the danger was. All the gang members were still strewn about the alley in varying stages of unconsciousness, their weapons gathered up and piled out of reach, and Mikey had surely called the police and was on his way back by now. He had successfully removed all physical evidence of their involvement here and a quick glance confirmed Raphael's continued presence as lookout. His brothers were safe, his enemies defeated, so what was the problem? 

Master Splinter had once told them that this ability to sense incoming danger, as unpredictable as it was, was both a product of their ninjitsu training and a gift from the gods. And while he'd had cause to be grateful for the cosmic assistance on more than one occasion, Leonardo sometimes wished the gods would be a little less subtle. Instead of vague hints and amorphous feelings without concrete substance, it would be nice to be occasionally presented with the psychic equivalent of a flashing neon sign. 'This way to impending doom,' would certainly save him a lot of needless worry and paranoia.

And perhaps paranoia was all it was. The only remaining unknown was the woman, who had crawled out of the dumpster's shadow and was now chatting amiably with Donatello. As he watched Don's hands spread out in an expansive gesture he only performed when excited, however, Leo decided there was little danger there. Despite his reclusive nature or perhaps because of it, Donatello had always been a good judge of character. If he trusted this girl enough to talk with her so animatedly then Leo had no reason to question his assessment.

…Still, he should probably get over there and talk to her himself. Maybe satisfying his own curiosity would put his mind at ease.

* * *

Donatello was outlining some of the basic philosophies of ninjitsu to a raptly listening Constance when he heard the sound of footsteps. He turned around to see Leonardo walking toward them, his expression cautious. 

Eager to reassure him, he grinned and gestured graciously to the woman. "Constance, I'd like you to meet Leonardo. Leo… Connie."

She'd been talking to Don for only a few minutes, but it was nevertheless enough for her to offer her hand without any of the hesitation she'd shown previously. Despite their odd appearance and strange names ( _'Leonardo', eh? I'm sensing a trend here…_ ), these were definitely the good guys. "Pleased to meet you, Leo," she said sincerely. "Thanks for the save."

The blue-masked turtle blinked and slowly shook her hand, not entirely successful in concealing his surprise. "You're welcome," he replied. His mouth curved into a small smile, which faded quickly when he got a closer look at his brother. His eyes widened. "You're hurt."

Donatello glanced down at his leg wound, which was still leaking blood at a sluggish rate. Shining almost black in the moonlight, blood had snaked down from the slash and followed the lines of his leg muscles, soaking into his kneepad. "It's not that bad. The knife didn't damage the musculature." He looked slightly bemused. "Truth to tell, I'd forgotten about it."

Despite these reassurances Leonardo sank to one knee and examined the injury critically. After a moment he nodded in agreement and said, "We still need to get the bleeding stopped. I'll make some bandages."

Walking over to the nearest unconscious thug, a wiry little man with a ridiculous green Mohawk, he grabbed the collar of his jacket and drew one of his swords. Lifting the material he prepared to cut it away from the man's body, only to be stopped by Constance clearing her throat. "Uh, Leo, if you don't mind…"

He looked up in time to see the woman take off her jacket and toss it on the dumpster's lid, revealing a long-sleeved cotton shirt. Gripping the hem, she pulled the garment over her head. Now clad in only a dark blue skirt and simple white tank top, sporting an embarrassed grin, she held out the shirt. "Use this."

"Uh, thanks," Leo said, taking the item of clothing. It was soft and white, and with the exception of a few smudges on the cuffs and collar, still quite clean. "This'll do nicely."

_She has freckles across her shoulders,_  Donatello thought dazedly, suddenly very grateful for his reptile origins. It wasn't possible for turtles to blush.

"I'm glad," Connie said. She quickly grabbed her jacket, to Donatello's secret disappointment, and slipped her arms back in the sleeves. "There's just no telling where that guy's been."

Don snorted in amusement as the shirt was quickly reduced to strips under the onslaught of Leo's sword and powerful fingers. Constance silently watched as Leo once again dropped to one knee and, after wiping away the worst of the blood, began to bandage his brother's wound.

She suppressed a sudden shiver. Connie had never been squeamish around blood, but it was nevertheless a little disquieting to see how briskly and efficiently Leonardo worked. For although his touch was gentle and Donatello's relaxed posture displayed complete trust, there was a sort of dispassion in their eyes that told her this kind of post-battle ministration was not uncommon.

Constance suddenly wondered just how often they got hurt.

Unaware of the woman's thoughts, Leo gave the knots on the makeshift bandage a final experimental tug. Satisfied, he stood up and used the last scrap of sleeve to clean his hands. "How's that?"

Donatello flexed his leg experimentally, pleased but not surprised when the dressing held securely. "It's perfect. Thanks."

Leonardo nodded and seemed about to comment when he was interrupted by the tinny beep of his communicator. Reaching behind his shell, he plucked it from his belt and activated it. "Leo here."

A voice promptly answered, sounding rough as shark's skin and deeply sarcastic, "Thanks fer the info' there, bro. I woulda never've guessed."

He rolled his eyes heavenward as Don smirked and Connie smothered a grin behind her hand.  _Everyone's a comedian tonight._  "What's up, Raph?"

"Mike's in sight now. He'll here inna minute."

"Good," Leo said. "Keep him with you. Don and I'll meet you there in-" he hesitated as Don gave him an entreating look and held out his hand, fingers splayed, "-three minutes."

"Better get yer asses up here quicker'n that," Raphael grumbled. "I don't wanna have ta deal wit' a bored Mikey." He cut the connection before Leo could respond.

As Leo muttered something uncomplimentary about hotheads and belted his communicator, Don turned his attention back to Connie. "My brother's on his way back, which means the police will be here in less than ten minutes. We'll have to leave as soon as we hear the sirens but you should be just fine until they arrive."

Constance nodded in agreement. Seemingly struck by a sudden thought, she frowned slightly. "I'm just wondering what the hell I'm gonna say to them. I can't very well tell the truth." She crossed her arms and gave him another lopsided smile. "They'll throw me in the loony bin for sure."

"There's no need to lie. Tell them what happened," Leo said, and then concluded with a wry smile, "just neglect to mention the 'ninja turtle' part."

Raising an eyebrow, the woman looked amused. "And that's not lying?"

"Selective omission, actually," Donatello replied innocently. "Which is something completely different."

Connie threw back her head and laughed. "Makes sense to me."

In a few minutes they would disappear from her life forever, and Donatello was mildly surprised to discover the thought saddened him. Despite their rocky start Constance had proven to be kind and remarkably easy to talk to. He had thoroughly enjoyed their conversation, however brief, and Don found himself wanting more of the same.

He took a steadying breath. Leo was probably going to have his shell for this, but he had to ask. "Connie, I-"

Don never got a chance to finish, for at that moment Leonardo felt a sudden premonition flash like a lightening strike across his consciousness. It arched and spat across every nerve ending his body possessed, jolting him into action with a speed that had little to do with grace and everything to do with desperation.

* * *

Raphael belted his communicator with a muttered curse and sank back into a sullen crouch. More waiting. If he hadn't been perceptive enough to realize the extra delay was primarily for Don's sake, he would've sworn Leo was doing this just to irritate him.

As a last-ditch effort to fend off boredom while acting as lookout, he'd been idly watching Don and the woman from the first disastrous beginnings of their conversation to its current relaxed and friendly state. And while it was obvious that Donatello was already half-smitten, he just couldn't see what the fuss was about. She was pretty enough, he supposed, but too damn doughy for his tastes. He preferred chicks with a little muscle tone. Like April, for example.

Yeah, Master Splinter's training was really doing wonders for that dame's figure…

He banished that line of thought with a firm shake of his head. Motioning impatiently for Mikey (who was idly shadow-boxing a few rooftops away) to hurry up, he glanced back into the shadow-shrouded alleyway. Still nothing of interest; just his brothers and the woman chatting away about who the hell knew what-

Catching a slight motion out of the corner of his eye, Raphael barely had time to cry out a warning as one of the supposedly unconscious thugs suddenly raised his head and pulled a pistol from under his body. His breath froze in his lungs as the small gun fired with an incongruously loud bang and the white flash of spent gunpowder. He saw one of his brothers blown backwards from the single shot even as he launched himself off the roof with a howl, drawing his sais as he plunged.

* * *

When the remainder of your life can be measured in seconds, there is neither the time nor the will for hesitation.

Leonardo unceremoniously rammed his shoulder into Donatello's side, sending him tumbling away with a startled cry, and made a desperate lunge for the woman just as Raphael's shout of warning split the night stillness. Leonardo's fingers had barely brushed the sleeve of Constance's jacket when the crack of gunfire assaulted his ears. A millisecond later an unassuming bit of metal slammed into his plastron with incredible velocity and sent him flying backwards in a shower of blood.

Stunned by an impact more devastating than any he had ever endured, he was completely unable to prevent his head from slamming against concrete with a crack that could be heard over Raphael's scream of abject rage. Pain as incandescent as a supernova flared behind his eyes and sent him spinning into blackness before he could do more than send out a fuzzy prayer for the continued safety of his brothers.

* * *

_Whoever invented the pistol was a fucking genius,_  David thought gleefully. With a simple pull of the trigger the happy little trio before him had disintegrated; the woman eating pavement while the blue-masked monster sailed backwards with a bullet lodged in its torso. Such power to be found in only a few ounces of metal and plastic.

Caught in a sudden heady feeling of invincibility, he swung his gun around and set his sights on the purple-masked one. Still sprawled against the wall where it'd been pushed and seemingly oblivious to the danger, its eyes were locked on the fallen form of its kin. If he'd been inclined to accredit it with any sort of human emotion, he would have believed it'd been rendered temporarily immobile in a fit of horrified grief.

His index finger was once again tightening on the trigger when a scream rent the air, causing him to flinch and snap his head up. Another creature, its mouth fixed in a snarl of wrath personified, leapt off the warehouse roof almost directly above him and drew its three-pronged blades, clutching them in its hands like claws. The tails of its red mask streamed behind it as it plunged towards him like a god of vengeance, and David had no choice but to once again believe in demons.

Priorities shifting abruptly, he forgot all about the purple-masked one and whipped his gun around with practiced speed. He squeezed the trigger… only to realize with a sudden jolt of dismay that, in a devastating stroke of bad luck, his gun had jammed.

_Oh shit…_

His dismay never had a chance to morph into true horror, however, for the demon chose that moment to land on his back. The sudden crushing weight snapped his spine in two with a dry, brittle sound. David didn't even have time to feel pain as six needle-sharp spikes pinned his neck to the pavement and sent him to eternity.

* * *

Donatello's breath left his body in a pained 'whoosh' as a heavily muscled shoulder slammed into his unprotected side, sending him reeling away like a drunkard after his fifth shot of whiskey. His shell smacked against the wall with a strangely hollow sound, driving him to his knees, and his head snapped up just in time to see the weapon discharge.

The rest of the world narrowed and faded into unimportance as he watched Leonardo take a bullet to the chest. The eternally analytical part of Donatello's psyche was screaming for him to move, to get away before he was gunned down too, but his body would not respond. He was frozen, entangled in a moment of visceral horror, as he watched his strong, seemingly invincible brother topple backwards with a blood-spattered plastron, astonishment in his brown eyes.

_No! Oh, no, no, no…_

The crack of Leonardo's head hitting pavement seemed impossibly loud, overwhelming even Raphael's howl of rage. An instant later the sick crackle of snapping vertebrae announced the end of the threat and broke through Donatello's paralysis, propelling him forward with a gracelessness he hadn't displayed in over a decade. Tripping over a suddenly malevolent obstacle course of fallen bodies and broken concrete, he fought his way over to his brother's side. His legs folded up beneath him and he dropped to his knees like a marionette whose strings had just been cut.

There was blood everywhere. It seeped in a spreading pool from a deep gash on the back of Leo's head and splashed across his chest, shoulders and even his face like macabre body paint. Limp and seemingly lifeless, Don couldn't even tell if he was breathing.

His hand shook slightly as it rose of its own accord and stopped, just millimeters away from his brother's carotid artery. He didn't want to check. Ah, god… if he pressed his fingers to Leo's throat and felt nothing-

His thoughts were interrupted as a streak of green and orange suddenly appeared at the alley's entrance, moving so swiftly that sheer momentum sent the turtle skidding several feet before finally coming to a halt in a tangled cloud of dust. "Guys, I heard gunshots and-"

Michelangelo felt the blood drain from his face in an almost dizzying rush, leaving his skin the pale, sickly green of long-dead pine needles. "Oh,  _shit_! Leo!" He rushed over and collapsed to his knees, tears forming in his eyes even as he clasped one of Leonardo's hands with both his own.

Raphael ghosted silently over to them; fists clenched and blood still dripping from his belted sais. In a voice utterly devoid of emotion he asked the question that was on all their minds, "Is he dead?"

Mikey's look of mute pleading forced Don to take a deep breath and steel himself. Sending out a fervent prayer to every god he'd ever heard of, he pressed his fingers to the fallen turtle's throat. For a moment all was silent as none of them dared breathe, then Don's shoulders slumped. In a voice made shaky with emotional overload, he said, "He's got a pulse."

He barely noticed as Raphael bowed his head, blowing out a low breath, while Michelangelo smiled in relief and gripped his brother's hand tighter. Hope, as potent as any drug, was surging through Don's veins, and as such his muscles barely felt the strain when he tore the tough cotton bandage from his leg and threw it at a startled Raphael. "Use this to staunch the blood from his head wound. Press gently, now; he might have a skull fracture."

As the red-masked turtle complied wordlessly Don turned to Mikey, who was looking at him with wide eyes. "Find me some light."

He blinked, and then asked hesitantly, "Where-"

"Check the weapons pile for a flashlight; set one of these goons on fire… I don't care! Just get me some light so I can  _see_."

Mikey leapt away like he'd been shot from a cannon.

Turning away long enough to forcibly remove a thin brown jacket from the body of a fallen man, he began to wipe away the blood as best he could. He suspected the bullet wound was in one of the bony scutes on Leo's upper plastron, but he steered clear of that area, not trusting himself to check until he had better lighting.

As he gently swabbed the red fluid from Leo's abdomen, shoulders and neck, a disquieting sense of wrongness began to niggle at the back of Don's mind. There was an oddity about the spatters of blood across his leader's chest. Some bit of long-unused knowledge about the patterns liquid made when…

The nagging thought faded as Raphael, who was monitoring Leo's heart rate with his free hand, frowned suddenly and said, "His pulse is weak an' his skin's gettin' cold." He gave Don a swift, urgent look. "I think he's goin' inta shock. We gotta get 'im back ta the lair."

"I know, Raph," Donatello replied softly, his hands never pausing in their work, "but we can't move him until we know how bad the damage is."

There was a cry of triumph from somewhere near the alley entrance and Michelangelo returned a moment later with a small penlight clutched in one hand. Dropping once more to his knees he activated the light and held it above his head, spilling yellow luminescence across his fallen brother's body. Thanking Mike absently, Don carefully dabbed away the blood from Leo's upper scutes, revealing a neatly drilled hole about the size of a dime. His eyes widened. "What the..?"

"What? What is it?" Mikey asked urgently.

"This isn't possible."

"Just tell us, dammit!" Raph snapped.

Don dropped the blood-soaked garment and ran a wondering hand across the hole, his sensitive fingertips barely brushing against the bit of metal lodged there. "He was shot from twenty feet away with an army-issue pistol, but the bullet didn't enter his body. It's lodged in his upper right scute."

The artificial illumination wavered as a shocked Mikey nearly dropped the penlight. "Not that I'm not glad... but how the hell'd that happen? Our plastrons are tough but they ain't Kevlar!"

"The bullet must have somehow lost velocity," Donatello murmured doubtfully. His logical side was clamoring for attention again, insistently pointing out oddities he'd overlooked in the past few emotionally-charged moments: the mysteriously decelerated bullet, the strange spatters of blood where no blood should be… and the now-conspicuous absence of someone whose existence they'd all temporarily forgotten.

Gripped by a sudden horrible suspicion, he snatched the penlight from Michelangelo's grasp and trained it deeper into the alley. The beam it emitted turned weak and watery after only a few feet, but it was nevertheless enough to outline a familiar form lying facedown in an awkward heap. Donatello's throat seized for a wide-eyed moment before he whispered softly, sadly:

"Ah, no..."


	4. Chapter 4

_**AN:**  Lots of cursing and gore in this one._

* * *

Raphael had been five years old the first time he truly understood that he was a freak.

His brothers and he had been playing in one of the tunnels that surrounded their old lair. Dark, drab and thoroughly uninteresting to anyone else who might have stumbled across it, the old flood channel was a place of mystery and grand adventure for four children who were rarely permitted to venture beyond the walls of their home.

It was during a rather rowdy game of hide and seek that Raphael had first discovered the passage. Nothing more than a little side tunnel barely wide enough to accommodate his shell, he had scrabbled his way past the opening and into the compact darkness; pleased at having hit upon a place he just  _knew_  his brothers would never find. It had only taken a few moments of waiting, however, for him to realize his tunnel extended much farther than he'd first thought. Impatient and recklessly brave even then, he'd soon grown tired of waiting for Mikey to find him and had decided to explore the tunnel further.

The tunnel had widened gradually the longer he crawled and it eventually spilled out into an echoing brick cavern more expansive than their lair, which sported several promising side passages. Intent on looking around just a little longer and returning before his brothers had time to miss him, he had ducked into one of those side tunnels…

And had promptly gotten himself lost.

He had wandered for perhaps an hour, from one dismayingly identical tunnel to another, before he'd heard the sound of voices. Hungry now and more frightened than he would have ever admitted, he had scrambled eagerly towards the familiar sounds… only to discover that, incredibly, it was not his family members who were speaking.

Two humans clad in baggy orange jumpsuits were chatting amiably while fiddling with some machine; a bulky thing on a tripod that he was sure Donnie would love to get his hands on. He personally didn't know nor care what they were doing with the contraption; his eyes were only for the humans themselves. They were big, towering even, but not the scary creatures that Master Splinter so often warned them about. In fact, as the blue-eyed man threw his head back and laughed heartily at something the large one had said; Raphael decided that they seemed quite friendly. The fat one with the red cheeks even looked a bit like Santa Claus.

Struck by a sudden impulse and too naive to know what was about to happen, Raphael had left his hiding place and crept over to say 'hi'.

Splinter had found him some three hours later, wandering aimlessly through tunnels nearly a mile from the lair, with bitter tears streaking his cheeks and a broken arm cradled gingerly against his plastron. He had remained taciturn throughout the painful setting and bandaging, utterly silent through the stern lecture that followed, and had slipped off to bed at the first opportunity. He had stiffly curled up on the hard mattress and pulled the covers over his head, silently shaking as the first seeds of rage began to germinate in his heart.

That single incident had brought home to him what no amount of Master Splinter's well meaning lectures could; they were freaks, outcasts of the lowest sort, and therefore worthy of hatred. It was injustice, it was truth, and he breathed it in with every fetid lungful of sewer air.

As the years passed and puberty set in with a vengeance, Raphael had eventually discovered that the ire growing in his spirit could only be alleviated through violence. Extended sessions with the punching bag did little but take the edge off and he loved his brothers too damn much to derive any real pleasure from pounding on them… so he turned to the streets for his own brand of comfort. Gangsters or muggers, one individual or a dozen, it didn't matter. Bloodshed was the name of the game and if they wanted to tussle he was more than willing to oblige.

When the breath began to hiss in his throat and the blood to seep from knuckles split and torn, the truth of his existence mattered little. It was only his speed and strength pitted against another's, only his training that would pull him through… or not. Regardless of the outcome, however, it was during these life-or-death moments that he felt most at peace. Carnage had become his drug of choice and he drank it down like fine wine.

Yes, Raphael understood violence better than most. But this… this he did not understand.

Kneeling in a cooling pool of his brother's blood, Raphael suppressed a curse as the red liquid saturated his kneepads and began to dampen the skin beneath. Damn guns. Stupid, hateful things wielded by people too cowardly or inept to be suited for anything else.

There was no true skill involved in firearms, no heady rush of pride when your opponent lies prone at your feet, overwhelmed by your superior skills. Not even the cold comfort of knowing that, if you were to succumb instead, then at least you would have died by the hands of someone worthy. No, with a gun and enough distance a child of two could easily kill the most powerful warrior who ever lived. Just as that gangster, too dim-witted to know when to stay down, could have easily killed them all had his weapon not betrayed him.

With his eyes locked on the hole partially drilled through Leonardo's scute and his pulse thrumming weakly against his fingertips, Raphael fervently wished he could kill that bastard again.

He was so lost in his thoughts that he barely noticed when Donatello snatched the penlight from Mikey's hand and trained it deeper into the alley. His attention snapped back quickly, however, when he heard Don whisper something indiscernible and then straighten stiffly. "What th' hell are ya doin'?"

"I'm going to check on Connie," Don replied, pointing with the light to the crumpled body several feet away.

Raphael's eyes softened somewhat at the distress on his brother's face, but his voice retained its steely edge when he said, "Forget 'er, bro. The cops'll be here any minute. We gotta book."

"I know," Don said. "Just… listen for the sirens and keep a close eye on Leo, okay? Let me know if anything changes." He turned on his heel without another word and began stepping over bodies, penlight still in hand.

As he watched Donatello push an unconscious man aside with his foot and kneel in the vacated space, Raphael took a deep breath and prepared to launch into an angry tirade. He was silenced before he could even begin, however, when Michelangelo touched his shoulder lightly. "Let him go, Raph. It'll be okay."

Raphael gave him an incredulous look and the orange-masked turtle grinned slightly, moonlight glinting strangely off his white teeth. "You just watch out for Leo. I'll go up and keep an eye out for the police. As dark as it is, I'll probably be able to see their lights reflecting off building windows a few blocks before we can hear the sirens."

He hesitated a moment before nodding. "Good idea, Mikey."

Mikey's grin blossomed into a full smile as he said, "Don't sound so surprised. I'm not just another pretty face, you know." He gave Leonardo's hand a final quick squeeze before once again fitting his hands with shuko spikes and climbing up and over the warehouse wall.

Raphael shook his head in the resigned fashion of older siblings everywhere, before his brow ridges once again drew together pensively. Taking his hand away from Leo's throat, he folded the trailing edge of Don's old bandage over the bit currently pressed against Leo's skull. He'd been trying to stop the bleeding for only a minute and a half and already blood had begun to seep through the thick cotton. He knew head wounds bled like a son of a bitch, but he didn't know enough to guess if this amount of blood loss was normal.

With his right hand pressing the doubled-over cloth against the gash, Raphael once again set his free fingers against Leo's carotid artery. His eyes slid almost shut as he concentrated on the beat beneath his fingertips. Still soft and steady, but had it grown weaker during those few unmonitored seconds? He simply couldn't tell.

The red-masked turtle growled in frustration, and for the first time since Leonardo was hurt, forced himself to really look at his brother. His face was slack in unconsciousness, the usual guarded expression gone. Even with the little flecks of blood standing out starkly against his unnaturally pale skin, Leonardo looked oddly peaceful without that look to tighten his features. Peaceful… and far more vulnerable than Raphael could ever remember seeing him.

His chest tight with a sudden amorphous dread, Raphael leaned forward until his mouth was just inches away from his brother's ear. He whispered fiercely, "Don't you dare check out on us now, Fearless. Don't you fuckin' dare."

* * *

Non-too-gently nudging an unconscious thug aside with his foot, Donatello sank to his knees beside the crumbled form of Constance. The bullet wound in her back was deceptively neat, just a small hole drilled through flesh and fabric, but the blood seeping out from under her body spoke of a devastating and messy exit wound. It didn't seem possible that she could be anything but dead.

Her hair spilled around her body in a tangled shroud that Don was loathe to part; yet part he did, pulling back her hair and exposing her pale face to moonlight. The pool of blood had spread past her shoulders, crept up to her chin and spilled into her mouth, painting her lips a deceptively cheerful red. Don's eyes widened and hope surged in his chest as he saw a red bubble swell on the surface of her lips, where it trembled slightly before bursting under the onslaught of her faint exhale. Incredibly, she was still breathing, still alive.

Bolstered by this sudden revelation Don gripped her by the shoulders and slowly, carefully, turned her over. He quickly unbuttoned her jacket and parted the fabric. Her tank top now looked at if it'd been dipped in red ink, with a hole slightly larger than a silver dollar punched through the material a few inches under and to the side of her left breast. Suppressing a grimace as warm blood squelched between his fingers, he gripped the sodden cloth and pulled sharply, widening the hole above the exit wound and allowing him to see the full extent of the damage. His eyes widened and he suppressed the urge to curse.

The gun had been held low to the ground and at an angle, which meant the bullet had punched through her lower back and slanted upward, causing untold damage before exiting through her chest. The bullet had to have shattered at least one rib and-

Donatello swore he felt himself pale as he watched a fine froth of blood bubbles form over the wound with her low exhale. God, it couldn't be…

Wiping the blood from her lips, he noted the bluish tint of cyanosis with a sinking feeling of dread in his gut. He pressed his fingers against her carotid artery and felt for a pulse. Weak and rapid, but there. Her breathing was shallow and labored, and when he bent his ear next to her injury and heard a distinctively viscous sound, his worst fears were confirmed. She had tension pneumothorax; a sucking chest wound. Jesus.

Ever since he was old enough to understand what kind of life they were destined to live, Don had committed every medical textbook and pamphlet he could find, borrow or steal to memory. This acquired knowledge had earned him the position of unofficial medic for their clan. He could bandage a wound in his sleep, adroitly set a broken bone and stitch flesh shut with all the skill of a veteran seamstress. But this…

He had read several texts dealing with chest wounds, but medical diagrams and passages filled with clinically detached terminology did nothing to prepare him for horror of the real thing. Her injuries were too severe, the blood loss too extensive, and he knew instinctively that she would die long before the police arrived. Unless he did something to buy her more time.

Heart suddenly pounding like a jackhammer, he took a steadying breath and willed himself to maintain level-headedness.  _Don't panic, Donny-boy. You know you can do this; you have to._   _Connie was kind to you,_ he let his gaze flick briefly over the bullet wound,  _and she saved Leo's life, albeit unintentionally. You owe her enough to at least try._

Thin-lipped with resolve, he removed the knife from Connie's jacket pocket and turned away, where yet another would-be mugger's jacket was quickly sacrificed on the alter of necessity. Setting the strips of cloth aside for the moment, he searched the jean pockets of the closest bad guys until he came across what he needed; a remarkably intact pack of cigarettes, still in its crisp plastic wrapper. Using the razor-sharp edge of the knife, he cut at the front of the pack until a four-by-five inch cellophane rectangle fell into his hand. Not perfect and by no means sanitary, but it would have to do.

Setting the cut plastic carefully on top of the bandages, he tossed the pack away and proceeded to remove the injured woman's clothing, sliding her arms out of her jacket sleeves and completely tearing away the sad remnants of her tank top. She looked inexplicably small and pitiful, clad from the waist up in only a bra and a fine patina of blood, but Don didn't notice. Finding refuge in a sort of detached professionalism, he gripped the penlight in his teeth, angling his head so that light spilled across her upper torso, and used the relatively clean sleeve of her jacket to dab away the worst of the blood around the exit wound.

With all that obstructing cloth out of the way, it was easy to tell that he had been right. The pleural space between her left lung and her chest wall, typically filled with negative pressure to allow the lung to expand and contract while breathing, had been breached. Every time she inhaled air was being sucked in through the wound and becoming trapped in the pleural space, slowly collapsing the lung and giving the left side of her torso a disturbingly compressed look, as if an invisible vice was slowly crushing one side of her body. She was killing herself with every uneven breath, and if he didn't do something to relieve the pressure on her lung she was unequivocally going to die.

Donatello's eyes narrowed and he gripped the cellophane rectangle firmly in one hand, the other hovering just inches above her upper body. It was terrifying and potentially dangerous, but he knew what he had to do. God, this was going to be unpleasant…

The moment Connie's chest began to fall with a labored exhale Don inserted a finger into the hole in her torso, forcing his way past shards of broken rib bone and into her chest cavity. He was rewarded with a hiss and an atomized spray of red as air, trapped under pressure in her narrow pleural space, was suddenly permitted an escape. Before she had a chance to inhale and suck more killing air into the wound, Don quickly removed his finger and slapped the piece of thin plastic over the bullet hole, creating an instant seal. With some of the pressure relieved and no more air able to enter the pleural space, her lung should partially re-inflate and allow her to breathe easier. He hoped.

Willing his heart to slow its frantic staccato beat, he blew out a shaky breath around the penlight. So far so good. Now comes the bandaging, not an easy prospect with only one available hand. What he wouldn't give for a simple roll of surgical tape right now…

He somehow managed to jury-rig a dressing, carefully pushing the cloth strips under her body one by one and pulling them across her torso and over her right shoulder and breast, creating an awkward-looking but stable dressing that held the plastic square securely on three sides. If he had done this correctly the single free edge of plastic should act as a flutter-valve seal, permitting air to escape the chest cavity but allowing none to enter, and thus preventing the recurrence of another collapsed lung.

Spitting the penlight into his hand, he rocked back on his heels and gave the seal a critical glare, sighing in relief only when the plastic flap lifted a little with her exhale and then sucked back tight over the wound as she drew air into her lungs.  _It's working,_ he thought with quiet pride. _Maybe I **am**  a genius._

He knew it was a little premature to start celebrating, so Don shook his head and once again grew serious. Her breathing may have improved but Connie was by no means out of danger yet. The blue tinge to her lips wasn't fading as quickly has he hoped and she was far too pale for his liking. He still needed to bandage the bullet wound in her back and turn her on her injured side to facilitate greater inflation of her good lung. And he should probably steal a few more jackets to-

"Don! Get yer shell over 'ere  _now_!"

Raphael's sudden shout was jarring and tinged with an unfamiliar edge of fear. A chill shot through Don with all the force of a cattle prod jolt to the spine and he lunged away so quickly he practically blurred, coming to a sliding halt at Leo's side.

It was easy to see what had so alarmed his red-masked sibling. Once wrapped in the stillness of the deeply unconscious, Leonardo was now trembling; a fine oscillation that blurred the edges of his limbs and drummed his heels lightly against the concrete. His skin was beginning to look like he'd been dipped in bleach, and when Don tentatively touched Leo's hand, the extremity was so cold it was startling.

As he watched fine beads of sweat form across Leo's brow and turn the edges of his mask a darker shade of blue, Don asked, his voice strained, "When did this start?"

"Right before I call ya," Raphael said, his eyes wide. "He was the same as before until this-" his hand waved, indicating Leo's entire body with one expansive gesture, "-suddenly started happenin'."

"He's in stage two progressive shock," Don murmured, his fingers on Leo's throat. His pulse was so faint it was hard to feel beneath the skin, which meant a significant drop in blood pressure. Another sign of stage two… and another thing that didn't make sense. It was not surprising that Leo was in shock, the sudden trauma to his skull could have easily triggered it, but there was no discernable reason for him to skip over the relatively minor symptoms of stage one nonprogressive and move right into the far more serious stage two. Unless-

His head snapped up and he looked at Raphael's hands, which were still applying pressure to the back of Leo's head. His eyes widened at the sight of the tattered remnants of Connie's shirt, now painted red and nearly saturated with far too much blood. "Why didn't you tell me the bleeding wasn't stopping?"

Raphael's shoulders hunched at the accusation. "Like I know anythin' about this medical shit," he snarled. "That's supposed ta be yer department, Don, but ya were too busy fawnin' over some human bitch ta take care of yer own brother!"

Lanced with unexpected guilt, Donatello bristled in automatic defense. "That's not-"

He never got to finish, for at that moment Michelangelo stuck is head over the side of the building and shouted, "Hate to break up this little love-fest, dudes, but company's coming! We're talking like two minutes; tops!"

As Mikey swung himself over the side of the warehouse and slid down the sheer brickwork, his spikes scoring lines down the wall and kicking up sparks, Raphael glared challengingly at Don. "Well,  _brother?_  Whadda we do now?"

The police were going to be here in no time at all, but two minutes was still an eternity for two people as badly injured as Leonardo and Constance; one bled white with a hole punched through her body, the other shaking himself to death in the grip of hemorrhagic shock. The word 'triage' circulated through Donatello's mind and he couldn't stop himself from shuddering. Two minutes of aid could make all the difference for one, while the same time spent in neglect would be a probable death sentence for the other.

He had a choice to make and he had to make it now. His brother or Connie. Who would he help? Who would he abandon and leave to die?

It was a choice that was no choice at all. Ties of blood and love would always win out, and so, hands clenched at his sides and a silent prayer for forgiveness in his heart, he turned his back on Constance both literally and figuratively. "We need to get Leo away from here before I can treat him," Don said steadily. "He can't be jostled too much so we're going to have to stick to the surface streets until we can find a manhole. Raph, keep pressure on that gash. I'll get his legs and I want you, Mikey, to lift him by the shoulders. Try to keep his torso as level as possible…"

* * *

With the phantom scent of his brother's blood in his nostrils and the lingering feel of Connie's pulse throbbing accusingly against his fingertips, Donatello tore himself out of the dream and jackknifed into a sitting position. God, again. It had happened again.

He groaned and rubbed at his bleary eyes before glancing at the alarm clock on his nightstand. Four twelve. Little more than two hours of fitful sleep. Not nearly enough, but it was all he was going to get tonight. He'd learned pretty quickly that it was nearly impossible to fall back asleep after the dream had run its course.

Disentangling himself from the blanket, he threw his legs over the side of the bed and just sat there a moment, trying desperately to shake off the dream that still clung to him like a tattered cloak. A nightmare garment that filled his nights with remembered horror and shed guilt with every movement…

The murky hush of his room seemed to suddenly shrink, drawing itself around him in a fashion that exuded menace. Struck by a sudden irrational need for the comforting familiarity of fluorescent lighting, he surged to his feet and staggered toward his workbench.

What happened next came as no real surprise. Still half sleep-blind and sluggish from the aftereffects of his dream, he had only made it a few steps before his discarded belt looped around one ankle and tightened like a noose. Pitching forward with an abortive yelp, he was quite unable to stop himself as his left forearm smacked against the corner of his workbench hard enough to bruise and sent him careening to the floor in an undignified tumble of limbs and leather strapping.

Sprawled flat on his shell with his belt still tangled around his ankles, he sighed and gave the darkened ceiling a baleful glare.  _A true ninja is a master of himself and his environment,_ Master Splinter had always said. Hah.  _This_  ninja wasn't very masterful at the moment; just clumsy, sleep-deprived, probably half crazy… and now quite thoroughly annoyed with the universe.

Donatello could only think of one word to express his opinion of the ludicrous debacle his life had become, and he took a deep breath and said it with feeling.

"Damn."


End file.
